Language Acquisition

1. Language Acquisition Beginnings of Language Development

2. Aims of Session • To identify the stages of Language Acquisition • To discuss the stages of Language Acquisition and to draw on our own experiences • To produce a leaflet on the stages of Language Acquisition

3. TASK • Page 3 Language Acquisition booklets.

4. Stages of development … • NB: Children do not all develop at the same pace. • However: Children all around the world do pass through the same set of stages. There is a universal pattern of development, regardless of the language being acquired.

5. Before birth … • Evidence suggests that even in the womb, the growing baby acclimatises to the sounds of its native language. • Mehler 1988: French new born babies were able to distinguish French from other languages.

6. Crying … • First few weeks: child expresses itself vocally through crying. • Signals hunger, distress or pleasure. • Instinctive noise (so not language).

7. Cooing … • Also known as gurgling or mewing. • 6-8 weeks old. • ‘Coo’, ‘ga-ga’ and ‘goo’. • Child develops increasing control over vocal chords.

8. Babbling … • Most important stage in the first year. • 6-9 months old. • Sounds begin to resemble adult sounds more closely.

9. Babbling … • Consonant and vowel combinations: ‘ba’, ‘ma’ and ‘da’. • Bilabial sounds most common (i.e. using the lips). • When these sounds are repeated = reduplicated monosyllable

10. Babbling … • These sounds have no meaning. • Baby makes far more noise than before. • Exercises and experiments with its articulators (parts of the body that make sounds).

11. Phonemic expansion … • Phoneme: smallest element of sound in a language that can display contrast and hence change meaning or function of a word, e.g. initial sounds in ban and Dan. • During babbling, number of different phonemes produced increases (expands).

12. Phonemic contraction … • 9-10 months. • Number of phonemes produced reduces to those found in the native language (contracts). • Baby discards sounds not required.

13. Phonemic contraction … • Evidence: noises made by children of different nationalities starts to sound different. • Experiments: native adults have successfully identified babies from own country.

14. Intonation … • Intonation patterns begin to resemble speech. • Common: rising intonation at end of utterance. • Other variations in rhythm/emphasis may suggest greeting or calling.

15. The first word … • Somewhere around 12 months the child makes its first recognizable word.

16. New vocabulary … • Acclimatised • Instinctive • Cooing • Babbling • Bilabial • Reduplicated monosyllable • Phonemic expansion • Phonemic contraction

17. TASK • Design a leaflet for expectant parents informing them of the stages in which their child will learn to produce sounds. • You should use the material you have learnt today along with some of your own experiences (if you wish) • Think of a title • What information do you want to include? • How will you present this information (e.g. bullet points, pictures etc.). Think about the layout.